Global day of action to beat scammers - Embargoed to 00.01 Tuesday Jun

That's the warning today as organisations in the UK, USA, Canada, Australia and the Netherlands join together in a global day of action and awareness to fight back against the criminals behind the scams.

From romance frauds and fake lotteries to share frauds and inheritance scams, mass market fraud is serious organised crime. In the UK, the Serious Organised Crime Agency, the National Fraud Authority, the Office of Fair Trading, the Metropolitan Police, the City of London Police, the Serious Fraud Office and the Financial Services Authority have joined forces to encourage victims everywhere to speak up, make a noise about fraud, and stop criminals succeeding.

CEO of the National Fraud Authority, Bernard Herdan, said:

“Fraud is a terrible crime yet often people feel embarrassed when they become a victim and so stay silent. We want every victim of fraud to report it to www.actionfraud.org.uk, to stand up to fraudsters and help us all work together to make the UK a more hostile environment for fraudsters.”

SOCA fraud expert Colin Woodcock said:

“To anyone who thinks this sort of thing can’t touch them we’d say complacency is a big risk. Many of us look at the sort of frauds that affect other people and feel confident we would never fall for them. But serious organised criminals are endlessly inventive and the UK is worth £3.5 billion to them every year through mass market fraud – they don’t want to give that up. Once people get wise to one scam, the criminals will switch to something else. Scams and frauds are often used to fund other crimes such as drug dealing and people trafficking. Individuals are losing hundreds of thousands of pounds, losing their homes and, in extreme cases, losing their lives when they can’t face the consequences of what has happened to them.”

The traditional Nigerian ‘419’ scam letter or email, which many people know and avoid, is the tip of the iceberg according to the organisations dedicated to tackling fraud and protecting its victims. Frauds are getting more plausible and more sophisticated as criminals try to stay one step ahead of public awareness and law enforcement action.

Most mass market frauds originate overseas but they often use UK addresses to give victims a sense of security. SOCA follows the trail upstream, working with the authorities in other countries to attack the routes that criminals use to target the UK. Large volumes of scam mail are seized in West Africa every year before it can reach its victims, thanks to close cooperation between SOCA, Ghana CID and the Nigerian Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.

SOCA has written today to around 200 people across the UK who could have become victims if the scam mail addressed to them had not been intercepted in Ghana in recent days.

In the run up to today's awareness day, City of London Police officers have carried out searches and arrests at a number of locations across England targeting the criminal networks behind mass marketing frauds. Detective Chief Superintendent Steve Head, from City of London Police's Economic Crime Directorate, said:

"Today's activities not only send out a clear message to callous criminals who target the vulnerable but act as a springboard for sustained action in countering this threat. City of London Police works hard to highlight that this is not a victimless crime, so it is pleasing to see both the national and international response to this threat. We all recognise the benefits of collaboration and pro-active prevention campaigns supported by robust enforcement activity."

As well as law enforcement success, victim awareness is a powerful way of defeating fraudsters. Metropolitan Police teams are on the streets of Bexley today advising people of the dangers of mass market fraud and the ways to avoid it. Detective Chief Inspector Nick Downing from the Met's Economic and Specialist Crime Command said:

"Our main focus today is raising awareness among those that are preyed upon by these persistent criminals. Relatives of the elderly and vulnerable need to be aware of the dangers of mass marketing fraud - the effect this type of scam mail has on victims is hugely underestimated. We have seen some people sending significant sums of money, sometimes their life savings to criminals in the post or via money transfer. The MPS are working tirelessly to prevent fraudulent mail entering the country in the first place, by working together with European police forces and partner agencies in the UK. Offering victims access to a support network is what our activity in Bexley today is all about."

There is lots of advice available to avoid becoming a victim in the first place, and support for those who suspect that they may already have fallen victim to fraud:

* Don’t stay silent. If you’ve been targeted by a fraudster and lost money, contact Action Fraud at www.actionfraud.org.uk or freephone 0300 123 2040

* Remember - if you haven’t entered a competition, you won’t have won a prize

* If something seems too good to be true, it probably is

* Ask questions - If someone is legitimate they won’t pressurise you or be elusive

* Don’t provide money upfront

* Be very wary about giving your personal information to strangers

* Look out for bad spelling and grammar, they are often a sign of a fraudulent organisation

* Remember that websites can be faked too, and that someone may claim to work for a well known company. Always check the real company’s details against the ones you have been given, and ring them direct if you are in doubt

For interviews and filming opportunities please contact:

SOCA: 0870 268 8100

NFA: 020 3356 1034

Metropolitan Police: 020 7230 4133

City of London Police: 020 7601 2220

FSA: 0207 066 3232

Types of fraud

Fraudsters boast that they have a scam for everyone – it’s just a question of finding someone’s particular weak spot. Here’s an overview of some of the common types of mass market fraud:

* Some fraudsters pretend to come from the very organisations tackling fraud, including SOCA. They even offer previous victims ‘professional’ help in recovering their money as a means of establishing trust and deceiving them a second time. This is known as fraud recovery fraud. SOCA and its partners never send members of the public unsolicited mail asking for their bank account details or cash.

* Be suspicious of high return share offers which promise little or no risk – they could be boiler room scams. Fraudsters often use hard sell techniques to pressure people into making quick decisions. They provide convincing and impressive looking documents and use authentic jargon to make the offer seem credible. They also try to persuade you that secrecy will maximise the value of the investment - in reality this is just to keep their crime hidden.

* Fraudsters will impersonate lawyers or legal officials to carry out inheritance scams. They will offer you their services in securing money left to you by a distant relative, and charge you for the various ‘fees’ involved. There is always just one more process and one more fee to be paid before the money can be released. The sum at stake is so large that paying several thousand pounds may seem worth it. Finally they ask for bank account details to pay in the inheritance funds – at which point they empty the account and disappear.

* A ‘missed call’ fraud will call a mobile phone for one ring only to entice people to ring back. When they do, they are calling a specially set up premium rate phone number without knowing it. Some fraudsters even use a recording of a phone ringing to keep people on the line for longer.

* Counterfeit cheque fraud is used to exploit people selling personal goods or renting out properties. The cheque is sometimes made out for more than the agreed price and the buyer asks for the difference to be refunded by money transfer. The cheque appears to clear but it takes several days before the counterfeit is identified, by which time the goods have been sent on without being paid for, on top of which the fraudster has been handed a sum of cash.

* Romance fraud is growing and there have been cases of kidnap linked to it. The victim meets someone online, or gets a response to an advert they have placed. Considerable investment goes into building trust, to the point where the victim will send cash to help with air fares or medical bills. Some romance frauds go on for many months.

* Ponzi schemes ask people to pay into an investment scheme, but pay subsequent investors from those funds rather than from profits. Like boiler room scams, they will use smart documents and credible language to lend authenticity. They will also advise secrecy to protect returns, but in fact just want to avoid discovery.

Notes for editors

1. The National Fraud Authority (NFA), established in 2008, is the Government's strategic lead organisation on counter-fraud activity in the UK. It works with a range of stakeholders across the private, public and third sector. The NFA’s objectives include: improving data sharing between public and private organisations; improving support to victims of fraud and improving awareness of fraud and self-protection from it. The NFA also runs Action Fraud, the UK's first national fraud reporting centre that provides a single point of contact for fraud victims where they can both report a fraud and seek guidance and advice.

2. City of London Police is the lead force within the UK for economic crime investigation. The expertise of its economic Crime Directorate is sought both nationally and internationally. The National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB) is a government-funded initiative run by the City of London Police, working in partnership with police forces and public and private sector organisations. It is collecting and analysing millions of previously unconnected reports of fraud and sharing the findings with law enforcement agencies and, in summary form, with its partners in industry. The aim is to help police forces tackle fraud and improve the understanding of the trends and patterns of fraud offending in the UK.

3. The FSA regulates the financial services industry and has five objectives under the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000: maintaining market confidence; promoting public understanding of the financial system; securing the appropriate degree of protection for consumers; fighting financial crime; and contributing to the protection and enhancement of the stability of the UK financial system. As part of its remit the FSA targets share fraudsters, commonly known as boiler rooms, who usually contact people by telephone and use high pressure sales tactics to con investors into buying non-tradable, overpriced or even non-existent shares. These fraudsters are unauthorised, normally overseas-based companies with fake UK addresses and phone lines routed abroad. The FSA has an unauthorised business department who are dedicated to this type of activity. The team investigates boiler rooms and aims to freeze assets, disrupt websites, publish warnings, bring prosecutions and where possible return money to victims. The FSA estimates the cost of boiler room fraud in the UK to be £200 million per year. Anybody who thinks they may have been targeted by a boiler room should call the FSA’s customer contact centre on 0845 606 1234.

4. The MPS has responsibility for the economic crime prevention strategy for London - ST£RLING. The initiative was launched in February 2005 and takes a pro-active prevention approach to reducing opportunities for fraudsters and combating economic crime. Officers host a number of industry forums in which they share best practice and work to design out fraud by reviewing and mitigating risk that the public and industry face. By focussing their activity on key crime enablers, such as virtual offices and false identity documents, they have a significant impact on the disruption of organised criminal networks.

5. SOCA tackles serious organised crime that harms the UK and its citizens. This includes Class A drugs, people smuggling and human trafficking, major gun crime, fraud, computer crime and money laundering. SOCA has around 4000 officers worldwide and uses traditional law enforcement methods to investigate and arrest criminals. It also draws on innovative new approaches to prevent crimes from happening in the first place.

Contacts:

NDS Enquiries

Phone: For enquiries please contact the above department

ndsenquiries@coi.gsi.gov.uk

Press Office

Phone: 0870 268 8100

pressoffice@soca.x.gsi.gov.uk